January Beach Day

With a beautiful day and the temperature at about 51 degrees in Atlantic City, NJ,  it was perfect for getting some vitamin D to counteract the lack of sunlight here in January. 

 

 

 

 

After hurricane Sandy the destruction is not evident unless you know where to look.  The marshes have odd things that have washed up.  As you drive by you probably won't notice what the storm brought into the marsh unless you stop and get out to get a closer look. The marshes along the Black Horse Pike  entrance to Atlantic City may have had more of this floating debris lodged into sensitive estuaries.  On the beach that I visited in front of the Taj Casino there were different shells including some winkles that I wouldn't normally find and maybe a few more bottles washed up. 

 

So where are those surf clams?

I used my little Fuji camera and with no view finder.  You couldn't see anything of the image on the LCD screen that you were trying to capture in the bright sun.

 

The Revel is still spectacular but if you get up close you notice that the gleaming panels are noticeably streaked and dulled.  I hope that all they need is a good washing and that the surface is not damaged.  Some columns have been encircled with bungee cords.  Maybe upon inspection someone might have noticed a loosening of some panels. 

Happy New Year's Day 2013 with Bling

 

All I can say is that gaudy sells---- especially during the outgoing year of 2012 when fashion and in particular handbags, could not have been more bedazzling.  So can a little extra bling be so bad?   Not in this area of South Jersey.  We welcome 2013 with an extra helping of bling and pageantry with the Philadelphia Mummer's Parade.  The parade is over a hundred years old and features performers adorned in feathers, glitter, mirrored studs, and colorful fabrics.   There are the comics, the fancy brigades, and the string bands marching up Broad Street.

 

The costumes are bright and showy but the people that appreciate the Mummer's Day parade will never say that they are gaudy or tasteless.  I tried to get someone to travel on the train with me to see it live but  nobody wanted to leave the comfort of their home.  So I took a few screen shots off of the television.  I remember when I was a kid and the all male rule was still in existence.   I loved seeing the drag queens that were allowed to strut their stuff back then.

 

 When they dropped the all male rule my sister was tapped to perform with the Palmyra String Band.  She went on to be Pinocchio and one other character.  It was a new life for my parents and their young daughter.  After the New Year's Day Parade, the spring and summer were filled with invitations to travel around the Northeast.  They made real friends where ever they went because they were invited to stay in the resident's homes in the towns where they visited.  I am twenty-three  years older so I wasn't a part of this fun-filled time.  I believe this string band has since disbanded.

 

My sister as Alice, in the 1983 Mummer's Parade:

 

 

A photo straight from the television: 

 

 

 Gaudy:

Extravagantly bright or showy, typically so as to be tasteless.

Synonyms garish - loud - showy - flashy     :(   A little background on the parade:   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BN8oJby0yr4   A shop in the Taj Casino on New Year's Eve featured an overload of bling:    Handbag Bling:             Not a part of the minimalist movement:     I believe this was the winner's performance.  Fralinger's String Band.  Please change the setting to 720HD for best viewing:    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wsz1glON7IU

Holiday Lobster Dinner

 

  Since my son will be working Christmas Day we got together for a  lobster and dungenous crab dinner that he made.  For dessert we enjoyed  goodies that he purchased at the Reading Terminal Market in Philadelphia.

 

 Here is a description from their website:

 

 

The Reading Terminal Market, established in 1892 at 12th and Arch Streets, is the nation’s oldest continuously operating farmers’ market. Through its long and interesting history , it has seen times both good and bad, but has emerged in the 21st century as one of the greatest public markets in the country.
When you visit the market, you can enjoy eating virtually every type of cuisine, from sublime soul food and exquisite Asian and Middle Eastern dishes to authentic Philly Cheesesteaks and traditional Pennsylvania Dutch fare — all available from largely family-run stands.

We had planned to visit the historic section of Pitman that features the Haggerty's spin of Christmas decorating but we decided to nix the idea.  Anyway I did a blog on that last year:

http://sixty-fourandcounting-philly.blogspot.com/2011/12/christmas-in-pitman-new-jersey.html

So I took a couple of photos of my son and his window lights:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I prefer to take Winslow Road from Williamstown, NJ to a section outside of Hammonton called Rosedale and there along the road I found a Christmas display that caught my eye.  It probably was a farmer from the area.  I will have to re-post when I can give a name of the owner but for now I will share the photos.  It had about 10 displays made up of individual little houses and a chapel.  People drive along and peer into the windows for a short tour of someone's idea of delighting the young and old alike:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I guess there was something very old-fashioned about this display and it reminded me very much of the displays in Pitman.  These days,  this type of decorating probably won't even make the local news because there are no flashing, twinkling, or chasing lights. Even more so the displays that get featured now are those that are hooked up to computers and feature music like the Trans-Siberian Orchestra or even the "Gangnam Style" hit with all the light activity coordinated with the music--spectacular I will admit,  but I am glad that not everything is hooked up to a computer.  
 

The General Store

 

 

     Took a ride to Wheaton Village in Millville, NJ with my friend.  I love the player piano in the General Store.  For a quarter the piano started up with "Walking in a Winter Wonderland" melody.  We skipped the Museum tour but checked out the other shops:  the Brownstone Emporium, the Christmas Shop, and the Paperweight Shop. I had my new Sony Bloggie Touch and my son warned me to hold the camera horizontally but I forgot and here is my first video:

 

 

 

 

  I remember a penny store candy shop across the street from my elementary school in Hammonton, NJ.  I was a tiny girl with no strong desire to push my way to the front of the line so I was usually last to get served.  And even though I am not a huge fan of candy today, I used to go for some of these old-fashion favorites like Maryjanes, Peanut Chews, banana flavored taffy bats, and sometimes the candy cigarettes but never those candy dots on paper or that sickening liquid in waxy little bottles! 

 

 

This shows a mannerly group of kids.  Back in the day it was a lady with a house dress and apron that waited on the kids that were bullies as I remember it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 So sorry that I did not pick up a few eyeballs at the bargain price of two dollars!

 

 

     After leaving the General Store we visited the other shops where you could spend thousands of dollars on artistic creations.  Christmas shopping in these shops was truly a unique experience featuring some South Jersey artists.

 

 

 

Anyone want to empty their wallet for a gift for me?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Glitter Houses for Your Glitter Village

    Who can resist crafts with glitter to bedazzle your creations?  The ultimate in glitter mania would be to re-create those cardboard villages that were sold in the five and ten cents stores in the late 40's and 50's. These glitter houses are often referred to as Putz-styled Christmas Villages.  They were given this German name because the word "putzen" in one context means to decorate.  Did you ever hear of someone "putzing" around?  Sometimes the word means cleaning.

       I did not discover this German connection and the Moravian church until I married my husband who grew up in Egg Harbor City, NJ.  This church has a strong presence in the town because the founding fathers were of German heritage. The most prominent Moravian Church is in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.  The Putz was used as a way to tell the story of the nativity to non-readers so the nativity scene was the primary focus originally but it evolved to include the quaint village scenes.   I remember my mother-in-law asking my husband to go out and collect some moss for her village.  This traditional practice of using moss and other natural enhancements would give the hills a  natural look and cotton batting was used to make snow covered mountains.  Some of lead figurines were 100 years old but others came from the 50's era including the skiers and the ice skaters that were placed on the pond.  The pond was fashioned from a mirror or aluminum foil. The hand-made twig fence was handed down over the years.  So I am sure many are not aware of this strong German influence of this custom of making village scenes.  I still have the figurines and the fence but sadly the cardboard houses are no more.  I do not remember what happened to them but I did get a collection of the Dickens Dept. 56 houses.  But the glitter houses or the Putz houses are far more wondrous than those porcelain houses.      

    I was delighted to be invited to my sister's house as she hosted her co-workers from the South Jersey Health Care system for the second annual Christmas craft night.  My sister has been creating the cardboard buildings for a few years now so to speed the assembly she precut the cardboard and painted the snow.  The houses featured chimneys, dormers, some with corrugated roofs, clear plastic windows, and shutters.  A free-form base had a hole to accommodate a battery operated tea light.  They began to hot glue the houses and features together and my sister assured them that the glitter would hide all imperfections.  Soon they were adhering the bottle brush trees near the foundations.  At the end they were grouped together and the lights turned out to "oo-oos and aahhs"!



Here are some web pages with more information.  The last link here might be useful if you plan on making your own glitter house. 

 http://www.bigindoortrains.com/primer/glitterhouses/glitterhouses.htm

http://littleglitterhouses.com/paul/small_glitterhouse/hl_beginning_glitterhouses.htm